NRC enlists GSA to help with artificial intelligence governance
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the General Services Administration are partnering for an artificial intelligence maturity assessment as a foundational step in the nuclear agency’s path to finalizing a strategic plan.
Over the next nine months, the NRC will welcome a GSA provided-project manager to work directly with staff to consult on what the agency needs to solidify an enterprise strategic plan, Basia Sall, the chief data officer and director of the NRC’s Data, Information Management and Enterprise Governance division, told FedScoop during an AI workshop at agency headquarters Tuesday. This partnership, according to Sall, is through a resource within the GSA’s AI Center of Excellence.
Sall teased the partnership last week during a press conference regarding the AI workshop and pointed to GSA’s assistance during the Tuesday event. The contracted project manager is expected to assist the agency in finding what it would need to build a strategic plan.
“We actually will have a contractor … that hasn’t been identified yet, that will work directly with our staff,” Sall told FedScoop. “They’ll come over, they’ll actually embed themselves and really do outreach in the agency and probably do outreach to our external stakeholders as well to really help us.”
The NRC had released an AI strategic plan in the spring of 2023, but is now working to release another strategic plan in compliance with Office of Management and Budget guidance.
Sall said the NRC has to work through an interagency agreement with GSA because the project manager is “doing all the contracting work, all the acquisition work on their side.”
“That is a huge benefit to us because we just don’t have enough current bench strength, as we’re hiring up right now to manage that,” Sall said
The partnership is in the early stages, according to Sall, and the agency is “still solidifying the deliverables and what we’re looking for.” She said that “in the next month or two, I expect us to have a much clearer path forward.”
The GSA declined to comment on the partnership, though its AI Center of Excellence offers details to users on how it measures AI readiness, specifically focusing on both organizational and operational maturity.
